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I've been everywhere That was the title of a hit country-and-western song from the late 1950's, originally sung by Hank Snow, and made famous by Johnny Cash. I resemble that! My 26-year career in the Air Force took me to more than sixty nations on five continents - sometimes only for a few minutes, other times for as long as four years at a time. In all that travel, I also managed to find the perfect partner, help rear three children, earn more than 200 hours of college credit, write more than 3000 reports, papers, documents, pamphlets, and even a handful of novels, take about 10,000 photographs, and met a huge crowd of interesting people. I use this weblog and my personal website here to document my life, and discuss my views on subjects I find interesting.

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Sunday, February 03, 2008

The Stupidity at Berkeley

The City Council of Berkeley, California, has voted to ban the Marine Recruiting Station from the city because the Marines refuse to enlist gays. It's immaterial that the local recruiting office has no say over the matter, or that there are ample, excellent reasons to NOT enlist active, open gay men and lesbian women into the military. The City Council of Berkeley believes it knows how this nation should be run, and demands that IT, not the Constitution, nor the Congress, or even the President, should have a say in the matter. Nor do they care whether non-gay men and women are interested in joining the Marines. The City Council has SPOKEN, and MUST be obeyed.

The military is one of several functions that are given to the Federal Government in the Constitution. Article 1, Section 8, clearly states that "The Congress shall have the power

(12) To raise and support armies...(13) To provide and maintain a navy;(14) To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;

I don't see anything in there about needing the permission of the City of Berkeley to do any of these things.

"Collective punishment" is a catch-word for the looney left, yet the City of Berkeley is collectively punishing the Marine Corps for the decisions made by the Congress, the President, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Berkeley has no authority to determine what federal offices will open in their jurisdiction. Six (seven?) of nine members of the Berkeley city council have decided they know better how to run the US military, and are attempting to "wag the dog" by passing a binding resolution demanding the city attorney look into ways of expelling the Marine Corps recruiters from their fair city.

Sen. Jim DeMint, R-SC, has taken it upon himself to present a bill to Congress to remove all earmarks (illegal spending, under any circumstances, since 99% of it is never PASSED by Congress, as the Constitution requires) to the City of Berkeley and any non-federal functions or facilities within that City. This is getting extreme howls from both the City of Berkeley and its congressional representatives. The City Council of Berleley seems to believe they have the option of "opting out" of any federal responsibilities they may have, while still sucking on the pork tit.

I explained to my children long ago that they have the option of doing whatever they choose. They also have the concurrent responsibility of accepting any consequences that go with those choices. There are three kinds of consequences - positive consequences (you do exceptionally well at work, and get a promotion), neutral consequences (you run a red light in the middle of the night, and no one sees you), or negative consequences (you put your hand on a hot stove, and burn it). If you commit a crime, you are (usually, except in the Liberal world) going to receive consequences. If you do something stupid, there may be grave consequences.

Berkeley wants to live in a consequence-free world. No such thing exists.

1 Comments:

The Berkeley Council is being inconsistent with its own position. As far-left radicals, these councilmembers must certainly abhor the military. So if gays aren't being recruited, that would be good for them, wouldn't it? Why the outrage?